The consummated, all-inclusive Spirit is the church’s bountiful supply. In Philippians 1:19 Paul speaks of “the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” Literally, the Greek word translated “supply” here means the supplying of all the needs of the chorus by someone known as the choragus, the leader or director of the chorus. The Greek word Paul uses thus implies a bountiful supply. The choragus supplied all the needs of everyone in the chorus, the needs for food, clothing, lodging, and musical instruments. The supply of the choragus truly was bountiful, even all-inclusive. In using the expression “the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ,” Paul likens the supply of the Spirit to that of the choragus. Christ as the intrinsic constituent of the church has been consummated as the all-inclusive Spirit to be the church’s bountiful supply.
The all-inclusive Spirit is the church’s bountiful supply in life and power. In Romans 8:2 Paul speaks of the Spirit as the Spirit of life. This life, of course, is the divine, eternal, uncreated life of God. The Spirit is the Spirit of such a life. The Spirit and life are one and cannot be separated. He is of life, and life is of Him. Life is His content, and He is the reality of life, even life itself. Life is of the Spirit and issues from the Spirit. The Spirit is the source, whereas life is the flow that comes from the Spirit. Because the Spirit is the Spirit of life, when we contact the Spirit, we contact life.
Acts 1:8a says, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.” Here we see that the all-inclusive Spirit as the church’s bountiful supply is also in power. To receive power is to be baptized in the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:5). The Holy Spirit was breathed into the disciples on the day of Christ’s resurrection (John 20:22) to be the Spirit of life to them essentially. The same Holy Spirit came upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost to be the Spirit of power to them economically. On the day of Pentecost the ascended Christ poured Himself upon His disciples to empower them. Therefore, on the day of Pentecost the disciples had both the Spirit of life within them and the Spirit of power upon them. Within and without, they were permeated, saturated, and filled with the Spirit.
The formation of the church is actually a mingling of humanity with the consummated Spirit. This is illustrated by the type of the meal offering. The main aspect of the meal offering was an oiled cake, a cake made of wheat flour mingled with oil. Oil was also poured upon the cake. We may say that the oil mingled with the flour was essential oil and that the oil poured upon the cake was economical oil. Eventually, the cake of flour, with oil mingled with it and poured upon it, became a loaf, and that loaf is a type of the church. “We who are many are one bread, one Body; for we all partake of the one bread” (1 Cor. 10:17). This is the formation of the church through the believers being mingled with the Spirit. Inwardly, we have the essential Spirit intrinsically, and outwardly we have the economical Spirit. In this way we are the church.
We have seen that the church is formed by the mingling of human beings with the consummated, all-inclusive Spirit. As members of the church, the Body, we have the Spirit of life within us as the essence for our spiritual existence, and we have the Spirit of power upon us as power for carrying out God’s economy. For our spiritual existence, the Spirit is the essential Spirit; for the carrying out of God’s economy. He is the economical Spirit. On the day of His resurrection, the Lord Jesus breathed the essential Spirit into the disciples. This caused them to be qualified to be mingled with the Spirit for the formation of the Body of Christ.
In forming the church, Christ was both the Breather and the Baptizer. After His death and resurrection, He became the Breather. As such, He breathed the essential Spirit into His disciples for their essence, life, being, and existence. After He ascended to the heavens, He became the Baptizer. On the day of Pentecost He, the Baptizer, baptized the disciples in the economical Spirit.
As the Breather, the Lord Himself was the breath breathed into His believers. This means that He was the essential Spirit entering into them to be their essence, life, being, and existence. As the Baptizer, He was also the Spirit in which He baptized His members into the one Body.
The essential Spirit was the base, just as the oil mingled with the fine flour was the base for the meal offering. Then upon this base, the mingled cake, the oil, signifying the economical Spirit, was poured. From this we see that the formation of the church first required the base: the essential Spirit entering into the believers to produce the wonderful mingling of humanity with divinity. Then upon this base Christ poured the economical Spirit typified by the oil poured upon the cake of the meal offering. The result of the breathing of the essential Spirit into the believers and the pouring out of the economical Spirit upon them was the formation of the universal church as the Body of Christ, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.
We all need to see that the formation of the church as the Body is altogether a matter of the consummated, all-inclusive Spirit mingled with and poured out upon the believers. This is the church, the totality, the aggregate, of the processed Triune God mingled with chosen, redeemed, regenerated, and transformed humanity. Eventually, such a church will consummate in the New Jerusalem.
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